Libertarian Main

Success story

We work so hard achieving ballot access so that candidates can be on ballots.

So, it is particularly thrilling when, within a period of several months, we both achieve ballot access and get a slew of candidates lined up to run.

Last summer, the national Libertarian Party invested close to $22,000 to help the Libertarian Party of Arkansas achieve ballot access.

This week, I’m happy to share that there will be 33 Libertarian candidates on ballots in Arkansas this year! That is a record number for Arkansas!

LP Arkansas Chair Michael Pakko says,

With nominees for all seven statewide constitutional offices and all four U.S. Congressional districts, every Arkansas voter will see at least eight Libertarians on their ballot this November.

Much of the credit should go to Christopher Olson, Chair of our Elections Committee (and now our candidate for Secretary of State). Chris and his team put in the long hours of contacting all of our previous candidates and prospects, shepherding them through the process of presenting their candidacies to our membership at the State Convention. It was also a great help to have Cara Schulz at LP National fielding calls and answering questions from prospective candidates.

I am excited about the quality and enthusiasm of our candidates this year. We need 3% of the vote in the race for Governor in order to maintain ballot access in 2018. Our candidate for Governor, Mark West, is already hard at work campaigning. I’m confident that we will get the 3% this year, and we’re already looking beyond that: We’re seeing 2018 as a break-out year for the Libertarian Party of Arkansas.

Congratulations to the LP of Arkansas for an outstanding job recruiting candidates. And, thank you for leveraging well the ballot access investment made by the Libertarian National Committee. Now, bottle that success and send it to other states!

If you’d like to invest in helping send this kind of success to other states, please give to our Ballot Access Fund today. This spring we’ll be investing in making this same success story possible in Ohio, Tennessee, and New York. Please be a part of it by donating here.